Mitch Marner will be sporting a different Maple Leaf in February.
The Toronto Maple Leafs star was one of 15 players named Wednesday to round out Canada’s 23-man roster for the NHL 4 Nations Face-Off tournament.
Joining the winger as part of an attack that already featured Connor McDavid, Sidney Crosby, Nathan MacKinnon, Brad Marchand and Brayden Point — all announced back in June — are Sam Reinhart and Sam Bennett of the Florida Panthers along with Anthony Cirelli and Brandon Hagel of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Also making the team up front are Vegas Golden Knights captain Mark Stone, Travis Konecny of the Philadelphia Flyers and Seth Jarvis of the Carolina Hurricanes.
The defence corps led by Cale Makar, who was also tabbed in June, will see Colorado Avalanche teammate Devon Toews suit up in red and white, and also include the Vegas duo of Shea Theodore and Alex Pietrangelo, Josh Morrissey of the Winnipeg Jets, Colton Parayko of the St. Louis Blues and Philadelphia’s Travis Sanheim.
The biggest question mark for Canadian general manager Don Sweeney of the Boston Bruins and the rest of the country’s hockey brain trust since the selection process began has been in the crease — especially with stud netminders like Carey Price and Roberto Luongo a distant memory.
Canada doesn’t have the same goaltending pedigree as at past international events, but head coach Jon Cooper of Tampa will likely lean on Stanley Cup winners Jordan Binnington of the Blues and Adin Hill of the Golden Knights. Sam Montembeault of the Montreal Canadiens rounds out the puck-stopping trio.
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“We are thrilled to unveil the group of players who have earned the opportunity to represent Canada,” Sweeney said in a statement. “We believe we have assembled a roster that features world-class talent, as well as success at the NHL and international levels.
“We are confident this group will give us the best chance to accomplish our goal on the international stage.”
The 4 Nations tournament, which also includes the United States, Sweden and Finland, runs Feb. 12-20 in Montreal and Boston, and will serve as an appetizer for the NHL’s Olympic return in 2026.
It’s also the closest hockey has got to a best-on-best men’s tournament since the 2016 World Cup.
The NHL, which went to five straight Olympics between 1998 and 2014, announced at last season’s all-star game players would participate at the next two Games after it skipped 2018 for business reasons and missed out in 2022 due to COVID-19.
The goal of the league and NHL Players’ Association is hold a World Cup in both 2028 and 2032 to get international events on a schedule of every two years.
Canada opens the 4 Nations on Feb. 12 against Sweden at the Bell Centre in Montreal before facing the U.S. in the same building three nights later.
The tournament then moves to Boston, where the Canadians will meet Finland on Feb 17.
The teams with the two best records after the round-robin will battle in the final Feb. 20 at TD Garden.
“This is an exciting time for the NHL and international hockey,” Cooper said. “This event is an important part of the process as we continue to build teams that can be successful on the international stage.”
Sweden, Finland take different approach with squads
Sweden and Finland rounded out their rosters for the 4 Nations Face-Off on Wednesday by choosing a handful of recent Stanley Cup champions to win the first international tournament with the NHL’s best players since 2016.
“It’s big value,” said Finland general manager Jere Lehtinen, who was also in charge of the team that won gold at the 2022 Olympics without NHL talent. “You have a few players who have won and have been in tough situations through their careers, so when it comes to a tournament like that, it’s a quick tournament. You have to be ready right away.”
Sweden selected Vegas’ William Karlsson, a 2023 Cup winner, and is stacked in goal with Minnesota’s Filip Gustavsson, New Jersey’s Jacob Markstrom and Ottawa’s Linus Ullmark, the 2023 Vezina Trophy winner who was traded by Boston before the season.
The Swedish Hockey Federation opted for veteran experience on defence with Edmonton’s Mattias Ekholm and Minnesota’s Jonas Brodin, to go with young Buffalo captain Rasmus Dahlin. Up front, the Swedes did not overlook youth, choosing Anaheim’s 19-year-old centre Leo Carlsson and Detroit’s 22-year-old winger Lucas Raymond among their forwards.
The Finns took some role players in piecing together a team in front of Nashville goaltender Juuse Saros, including Montreal’s Joel Armia and San Jose’s Mikael Granlund, who’s having something of a career renaissance with the Sharks.
“As a young player in Finland, that’s one of the biggest things you can have in a hockey career, to play for your country,” Granlund said this week. “I’ve always just actually loved those moments and I’ve had good success on the national team. It’s really cool and, having the 4 Nations, that’s best against best, so that’s special.”
Games to be held in Montreal, Boston
Among the final decisions, Sweden left off Hampus Lindholm to bring Brodin, citing the Boston defenceman’s injury and tight timeline as the reason. Finland put Patrik Laine on the roster that had to be locked in earlier this week before the scoring winger made his season debut Tuesday night for Montreal.
Because the NHL did not participate in the 2018 Olympics in South Korea and pandemic-related scheduling issues forced the league to pull out of the 2022 Games in Beijing, this is the first country versus country men’s tournament in the sport with the best players involved since the World Cup of Hockey in 2016.
The hope was to stage the event this past winter, but questions over how to handle Russian players given that country’s war in Ukraine pushed it to 2025 and reduced the teams involved to these four.
Each country’s first six players were named in late June:
- Canada: Sidney Crosby, Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar, Brad Marchand and Brayden Point
- United States: Auston Matthews, Jack Eichel, Matthew Tkachuk, Quinn Hughes, Charlie McAvoy and Adam Fox
- Sweden: Mika Zibanejad, William Nylander, Filip Forsberg, Victor Hedman,
- Erik Karlsson and Gustav Forsling
- Finland: Juuse Saros, Aleksander Barkov, Mikko Rantanen, Sebastian Aho, Miro Heiskanen and Esa Lindell for Finland
“The excitement is palpable, not just among fans but among the players,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said Sunday in Boston. “That’s one of the reasons we brought back international best-on-best [competition]. We know how important it is to our players to represent their countries, and so we’re really looking forward to it.”
The NHL has committed to participating in the Milan Olympics in 2026 and then again in 2030 in the south of France. The goal of the league and Players’ Association is to get on schedule with an international tournament every even-numbered year with World Cups in 2028, 2032 and beyond.
